End of Semester Take Away

My first and  maybe the biggest thing that impacted me during class was from my fear project.  I talked about how fear is not always is a negative thing.  You might wonder why I think that way. I've noticed that I use fear as a motivation to overcome.  It will  boost my confidence and I would feel like I could accomplish something.

The next thing I took away was the idea of escapism.  I do use it to try to escape from my problems in the world.  Most of the time, though, I am sometimes not happy when I do it because none of my problems.  I try now not to escape from my problems but try to solve them if possible.

The last thing that I took away from this class was just thinking out of the box.  Throughout my life I've been told exactly what to do by my teachers or professors.  When we had the egg project, I was nervous.  I did not have a lot of direction on it so it was challenging for me.  It is welcomed, though, because I know in life that no one is going to hold my hand as I do things.  This was a great lesson for me and one I would use in the future.

Day 16 Take Away

Last class we presented our altered books.  What I thought that was interesting is that most of our books had to do with out fear project in a way.   Not everyone did it but I've noticed it was a trend upon most.  I guess that the fear project had impacted most of us because it really shows each of us what we care about.  It also shows what we don't care about.

"Altared" Book of the Self

I am not honestly a big fan about technology and the human body combing together.  When I watched the video I was actually kind of disturbed.  I actually didn't finish the video because of what I saw.  The reason that I was disturbed is because it just doesn't look natural.  When something looks unnatural to me like tampering with a human body with technology, I do get disturbed.

In a way I think that is going to far.  I don't mind having technology combined with our clothing.  That does not bother me at all but having wires or whatever inside of you just doesn't seem right to me. If it were for medical reasons, then I won't have much of a problem with that.  This is also how I feel also about media arts as well.  I just don't think that it is necessary.

For my altered book project, I used my sophomore year book. You might be wondering why. That was not a great year for me during high school for many reasons that I don't want to talk about.  What I did is that I cut out half of the pages out of the book.  I will explain later why I did that. Then I spray painted the back cover all black.

After that I used normal white paint to draw cracks all over the back cover. This idea came from my egg project back at the beginning of the semester.  The black cover represents my fears and the unknown.  The white cracks represent that when I get beaten down by fear I always try to overcome it. In other words the cracks represent that I will run into obstacles in the future but I will not break.  The cracks also show that even sometimes in the unknown I get an idea on what will happen both good and/or bad.

In the front cover I glued a picture of the "stain-glass" I've created back in round the robin project.  This represents me on how I portray myself to others.  The blended shapes represent the different interests that I have and the bright colors represent on how I like to help others in a way.  I remember last week that my friends and I went to this event called "Speech Night" at a theater downtown.  After the event one of my friends lost his keys back in the theater and he did not realize it until we got back to the parking lot at campus..  My consensus got the better of me so I went with him.  Good thing that I did because I found them when he was about to give up searching.

The pages represent my history and personality.  It shows how I portray myself to others.  The reason that I cut out the other half is because it is suppose to represent my future and the unknown.  Questions go through my head.  Will I be like the same way I am now?  Am I going to succeed in the future?  Usually stuff like that is what I think about.

How the book might change me?  I don't think that the book will change what I am because I like the way that I am.  There of course there are some things that I like to change though.  For example, I am a procrastinator.  That is probably one of the biggest things I would like to change.  Overall, though, I don't think that I won't change or change that much.  Who knows, though, what will happen in the future.

Day 14 Take Away

The biggest thing that I took from the last class was one of my classmates presentations.  His fear was loneliness.  So what he did is that he did not, or I think he didn't, talk to any of his friends during his free time.  That includes messaging by phone and social media. He said that he had highs and lows while doing this project but he said it was a good experience.  I was impressed that he was able to do this for a whole week because it was hard on him because I'm not sure if I'm able to do something like that.

Day 13 Take Away

Last class was interesting.  Most of us shared our fear projects for the class.  What I noticed during our discussions is that mostly our class overall is afraid of failure and/or time. I did not find that surprising knowing the circumstances that we are all in. I believe, though, that we all understood our fears and others' around us.  How fear affects our life and what each of us do with it.

My Fears

I had a tough time deciding what fear I would like to do so I decided to do all of them because they all impact on my life. So I used all forms of worry, phobia, fear and anxiety.

I notice fear when mainly something unpleasant that happened in my life.  Usually nothing major but the fear does develop over time.  For example, one thing that I am afraid of is failure. In school I did struggle a few times and because of that I have gone to “special” classes or get “special” help within my normal classes. After a while I did not like it because it made me feel like an idiot. So whenever I accomplish something with no help it raises my confidence in myself.  Although, sometimes I can be cocky that hurts me sometimes but I am getting better figuring out when I do really need help.

Most of the time I use fear as a way to motivate myself.  It will make me feel like I accomplished a goal if I overcome that fear.  

I don’t know if fear plays that much into my creativity.  Most of the time I am somewhat care-free whenever I engage in creativity. Probably the some moments when fear plays a part in creativity is when other people judge my work and time.

I used varies fears in this project.  Most of them are deep but there are those that are surface.  Like for example, I am afraid of spiders is a surface fear while failure is a deep fear.

I think that this project shows that my fears have to do with my confidence in myself.  For my project I took index cards and wrote about all little more than a dozen things that I am afraid of or things that have to do with those fears.  Then I will give each classmate a card.  If there more people I will have them write down their own fears because your fears could affect other people.  After that I will have them crumple them up into balls and have them throw them at me.  I am supposed to represent my confidence while the index cards represent, as said before, my fears.  The fear pelts me and hurts my confidence and what I want to accomplish.

Bliss

Fear list:

Time

Supplies

Money

The unexpected

Creativity

What-if questions:

What if I use pencils to make a fort?

What if I use old supplies?

What if I be prepared what will happen?